Being in a University at Buffalo classroom is a familiar
experience for Christopher Daly. He is a third-generation graduate
of UB’s School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences
(SoPPS), who chose UB for graduate studies as well, entering a
dual-degree program that led to Doctor of Pharmacy and Master of
Business Administration degrees.

Now, Daly is again in the classroom--as one of the SoPPS’s
newest faculty members.

“Joining the faculty was an opportunity that presented
itself last year,” says Daly. “I wanted to find a
dynamic job working with people on the forefront of creating and
trying to understand new business models for the pharmacy
profession.”

Daly was intrigued by the opportunity for academic
entrepreneurism, a mindset that brings the intellectual capital of
the university’s faculty to bear on the private sector
economy, creating partnerships that ultimately advance the
profession.

Daly sees the role of teacher in a similar vein, as someone who
shares the best knowledge possible, but always with an eye toward
the future.

Fourteen independent study students of Daly’s are tasked
with questions about how pharmacists will participate in possible
future health care systems and what the next steps might be for the
profession.

The experience energizes Daly; he’s excited about teaching
and he’s excited for his students.

“There are so many opportunities at UB for innovative
practice, whether that’s participating in patient-centered
collaborative health care teams, novel continuing education
instruction or multidisciplinary research opportunities,”
says Daly. “When you take all that with the downtown
renaissance and the infrastructure investment which includes the
new medical campus, it’s hard not to get excited about the
opportunity.”

Whatever the future brings, it is sure to be very different from
the pharmacy practice Daly witnessed growing up. Daly’s
grandfather started a private pharmacy fifty years ago, which his
parents, both UB School of Pharmacy grads, currently own.

Daly says that his family’s involvement with the pharmacy
didn’t necessarily steer him toward the profession, but it
did show him what the career could offer.

In fact, Daly began his undergraduate studies as a classical
trumpet major, before leaving the arts for the sciences. Music is
still very much part of his life; Daly is in the Thursday night
rehearsal band at Buffalo’s historic Colored Musicians Club
and he recently joined a brass band—a hobby that, in
its traditionalism, provides an interesting juxtaposition to the
forward-thinking nature of his research and teaching.

“There is an ongoing evolution to the pharmaceutical
sciences,” says Daly. “What we’re doing today at
UB is making way for where the profession will be in years to
come.”

Buffalo borders Canada and is one of the United States’ top gateways for international trade. Each year, thousands of Western New Yorkers visit the beaches of Fort Erie, the Canadian side of Niagara Falls and cosmopolitan Toronto.